Jay Harvey Upstage

The Cohen-Rutkowski Project in full cry  I suspected it would be good to catch the Cohen-Rutkowski Project again at the Jazz Kitchen , but I'd forgotten it had been so long ago as the Covid-emergent era of November 2021. It proved well worth a return visit, as this well-stocked, mutually supportive group commendably  held down the one-set Sunday night spot at the club yesterday. Co-leaders Rich Cohen, a hearty virtuoso on alto and tenor saxophones, co-leads the group with composer-pianist Chris Rutkowski. For this visit, a guest of star quality, Mark Buselli, helped Cohen fill out the front line. The trumpeter-flugelhornist also took a turn on congas, and it would have been a shame if those drums had been  onstage only for show, as this established jazz academic also sports a learned elbow and a sliding wetted finger to alter the pitch in solos.  The rest of the rhythm section consisted of equally capable drummer Chelsea Hughey  and  bassist Joe Tyksin...

A comedy that poses the immediate threat of a foreigner's execution has a steep hill to climb toward the happy ending everyone expects in the genre. That's why Shakespeare's title of this early play is an important signal of what's needed for the audience to process a parade of implausibilities. Among comedies, then, this one is in a class by itself: "The Comedy of Errors."  The saga of the twin Antipholuses displayed in IndyShakes production. The Indianapolis Shakespeare Company has lopped off the title's definite article, perhaps so the play will appear more loosely generic.  And when Act A Foo Improv Crew appears in the marketing, potential attendees are justified in wondering if this is some sort of adaptation of Shakespeare's play. riffing on the theme of mistaken identity undergirded by verbal and game-playing spontaneity.  Deliberate, rather than accidental,  mistakes of this kind have unfortunately become a serious matter. American citizens and...

Sam Rivers in action  It was understandable that Sam Rivers would be hailed as an elder statesman of jazz long before his death at 88 in 2011. He had a career of restless, inspired collaboration and his personality as both saxophonist and bandleader was firmly stamped on the vast realm of post-bop jazz. It was a fertile area for exploration, and Rivers affected a host of younger players, including, briefly, the well-established Miles Davis. He had a loose sense of form and ensemble balance, but it was by no means mindless free-for-all thinking that animated him. One writer described his big-band writing as a cross between Duke Ellington's range of work and John Coltrane's "Ascension," a superficially chaotic ensemble that included Indianapolis' Freddie Hubbard. The common bond (between Ellington and Coltrane) fed into Rivers' artistry partly through trust in the individuality of his sidemen as both ensemble members and soloists. With "Sam Rivers 100"...